Author: Henry Wray

Sometimes it’s hard to figure out who’s worse: Trump or his critics. Trump clearly hit a new low with his disgraceful Helsinki press conference in which he took the word of Putin over U.S. intelligence agencies concerning Russian interference in the 2016 election. His performance was rightly greeted with almost universal scorn across the political spectrum. (Faced with overwhelming criticism, Trump now claims, no doubt disingenuously, that he “misspoke.”) Repeating a familiar pattern, however, some Trump critics couldn’t resist going beyond the merits and descending to his level with their own outrageous hyperbole.

The most egregious excess was the accusation that Trump’s statements at the press conference somehow amounted to “treason.” One might expect this kind of nonsense from late night TV comics and hopelessly biased politicians and pundits. However, respected columnist Thomas Friedman joined in as did former CIA Director John Brennan. Brennan’s version takes the cake. He tweeted:

“Donald Trump’s press conference performance in Helsinki rises to & exceeds the threshold of ‘high crimes & misdemeanors.’ It was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump’s comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the pocket of Putin. Republican Patriots: Where are you???”

These charges are baseless. Article III, section 3 of the Constitution states that “[t]reason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort.” Treason is the only crime specifically defined in the Constitution. It is well established that the definition can be met only when the United States is engaged in declared or open warfare with such “enemies.” One expert observed that the framers saw the need to define  treason so narrowly and to place it in the Constitution in order to ensure that this concept was not weaponized for use against political opponents.

Of course, that is exactly what Trump’s critics are doing here. Such empty rhetorical excess plays into Trump’s hands by undermining the credibility of those who voice it—particularly Brennan, a central player in the intelligence community’s assessment of Russian interference. It also serves to further politicize this already thoroughly politicized subject. The threat of continuing efforts by Russia to undermine the integrity of our elections is undoubtedly real, and it could become critical if the Russians (or other bad actors) are able to exploit our cyber vulnerabilities and penetrate state election machinery. Continuing to treat this subject as a political football and using it to bait Trump impedes the vital mission of investigating these threats thoroughly and objectively so we can adopt the necessary countermeasures.

 

When it comes to Supreme Court confirmations, the hypocrisy by both political parties is as transparent as it is breathtaking. Recall the (legitimate) outrage voiced by Democrats not long ago when Republican Leader McConnell refused to accord the slightest good faith consideration to former President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland, a highly qualified candidate for the Court. Fast forward to President Trump’s nomination yesterday of Brett Kavanaugh, another highly qualified candidate. As soon as the Kavanaugh nomination was announced and before the confirmation process began, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer vowed to “oppose him with everything I’ve got.”  A number of other Democratic Senators echoed this pledge. At least one Democratic Senator announced his refusal to consider Trump’s nominee even before the nomination was announced. The substantive difference between McConnell’s stance on Garland and the Democrats’ stance on Kavanaugh is?

The recent report by the Justice Department Inspector General (IG) on the FBI’s Hillary Clinton email investigation is being sliced and diced in many  directions by a host of pundits and political partisans. Largely overlooked in all the spin is what in my view constitutes the most troublesome aspect of the Clinton investigation addressed in the report: The nearly one-month gap between when the FBI discovered a large trove of Clinton-related emails on Anthony Weiner’s laptop and when they started to examine these emails.

Two basic points emerge from the IG report’s treatment of this subject. First, the report’s findings and conclusions make a compelling case that the delay in examining the Weiner emails was indeed motivated by political bias or other improper considerations. Specifically:

• The report identifies Peter Strzok as the FBI official directly responsible for following up on the Weiner emails.
• The report presents extensive evidence of Strzok’s bias against Trump, including his explicitly stated determination to prevent Trump’s election.
• The report finds that within days after the discovery of the Clinton-related emails on Weiner’s laptop in late September 2016, FBI officials in Washington understood the extent and potential significance of these emails and had all the information needed to obtain a search warrant to examine them.
• The report demonstrates that a conscious choice was made not to pursue the Weiner emails until after the presidential election. FBI officials, including Strzok, conceded this choice and offered various explanations for it.
• The report concludes that none of the proffered explanations was persuasive. In particular, it states “we do not have confidence that Strzok’s decision” in this regard “was free from bias.”

Second, the delay in examining the Weiner emails triggered a series of events that may well have changed the election outcome. Putting off the Weiner emails until after the election became untenable in late October when the FBI’s New York office pushed back against the delay and, in effect, forced Washington officials to act. This, of course, caused two weeks of political frenzy in the waning days of the presidential campaign, starting with FBI Director Comey’s infamous October 28 letter notifying Congress that the Clinton investigation was being reopened. Not until two days before the election did Comey send a second letter announcing that the Weiner emails did not affect the Clinton case after all.

Many partisans as well as some independent observers are convinced that Comey’s October 28 letter tilted the election to Trump. We may never know for sure whether Strzok delayed the examination of Weiner’s laptop in order to give Clinton a boost over Trump. However, whether or not this was his plan, the delay certainly had the opposite effect. So much so that, in a remarkable twist of irony, Trump may have Strzok to thank for his election.

Background of the IG review. The IG review focused on three major phases of the Clinton email investigation: the investigative steps leading up to the decision to decline prosecution of Clinton, the declination decision itself, and the reopening of the investigation after Clinton-related emails were found on Weiner’s laptop. For each of these phases, the IG considered whether investigative or prosecutorial decisions were based on political bias or other improper considerations.

The report has been described as concluding that none of the decisions resulted from political bias. However, this is not what it says. In examining the question of bias, the IG applied two distinct tests: First, was there “documentary or testimonial evidence that improper considerations, including political bias, directly affected specific decisions”? Second, were there plausible merit-based justifications for the decisions or were the stated justifications merely “pretextual”? (iii) (Parentheticals reference page numbers in the report)  With regard to the latter, the report observed:

“The question we considered was not whether a particular investigative decision was the ideal choice or one that could have been handled more effectively, but whether the circumstances surrounding the decision indicated that it was based on considerations other than the merits of the investigation. If the choice made by the investigative team was among two or more reasonable alternatives, we did not find that it was improper even if we believed that an alternative decision would have been more effective.” (ii-iii)

The IG found no “documentary or testimonial evidence” that any decision was “directly affected” by political bias or other improper considerations. This test sets an extremely high bar that essentially nothing short of a confession would meet. Thus, the absence of such “smoking gun” evidence is unsurprising (although the Strzok evidence comes very close). On the second and more realistic test, the IG concluded that all decisions it evaluated up to and including the declination were reasonably justified on the merits and thus appropriate exercises of discretion. As discussed below, however, the IG concluded that the FBI’s handling of the Clinton-related emails on Weiner’s laptop was a very different story.

The Weiner emails. In September 2016, after the Clinton investigation closed, the FBI’s New York field office began investigating Weiner, the husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin, for an improper online relationship with a minor. Pursuant to a search warrant, the New York agents seized Weiner’s laptop and other electronic devices on September 26. The New York FBI case agent charged with examining these devices discovered almost immediately that the laptop contained a huge trove of Clinton-related emails. Recognizing its potential impact on the Clinton investigation, he promptly notified his superiors of this discovery. Just two days later, on September 28, New York agents briefed the Washington FBI on the existence of the email trove via a video teleconference. According to the IG report, Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe led the teleconference and about 39 senior FBI executives likely participated. (vii) McCabe told the IG that he viewed the discovery of the emails as a “big deal” (281) and on the same day he instructed Strzok to have his team contact the New York office about them. (279)

Strzok was the leader of the FBI’s Clinton email investigative team. (43) According to McCabe, he also was directly responsible for following up on the Weiner laptop. (310) Strzok and Lisa Page, his paramour and another senior FBI official heavily involved in the Clinton investigation, are now widely known for their anti-Trump texting. The most notorious example, first revealed in the IG report, is Strzok’s assurance to Page that “We’ll stop” Trump from ever becoming President. (xii)

The logical next step at this point was for the Washington FBI agents to obtain their own search warrant to access and review the Clinton-related emails on Weiner’s laptop. (The New York agents investigating Weiner had neither the legal right under their search warrant nor the background to review the Clinton emails.) Remarkably, however, no effort was made to get the search warrant for almost a month. The IG report states that several discussions about the Weiner emails occurred on October 3 and 4 but:

“[A]fter October 4, we found no evidence that anyone associated with the [Clinton] investigation, including the entire leadership team at FBI headquarters, took any action on the Weiner laptop issue until the week of October 24, and then they did so only after the Weiner case agent expressed concerns . . . prompting [New York officials] to contact the Office of the Deputy Attorney General (ODAG) on October 21 to raise concerns about the lack of action.”

Specifically, the Weiner case agent feared that the delay in dealing with the emails he had discovered would eventually become known and he would be “scapegoated.” (305) In this regard, the New York officials cautioned that the case agent “was stressed out and might act out in some way.” (304)

The IG report rather dryly observes that this warning from New York generated “renewed interest” on the part of the Washington FBI in the Weiner email issue. (311) As they say, the rest is history. Within the next two weeks Washington finally got its search warrant, Comey sent his October 28 letter, FBI agents worked “around the clock” to review the emails, and on November 6—just two days before the election–Comey notified Congress that the emails did not change the FBI’s earlier conclusions regarding the Clinton case.

As noted previously, Comey’s October 28 letter may well have changed the election outcome. The fallout from the letter certainly dealt a tremendous blow to the FBI’s credibility and stature as a nonpartisan organization. Had the FBI promptly accessed and evaluated the Weiner emails, these consequences very likely would have been avoided. To be sure, Comey might have felt obliged to notify Congress even if this effort had started in early October. However, the process would have played out weeks rather than days ahead of the election, thereby giving the public considerably more time to process the FBI’s eventual conclusion that the Weiner emails did not affect its Clinton findings.

Supposed explanations for the delay. The IG report didn’t uncover a formal, documented decision to delay action on the Weiner laptop. However, it’s clear from the report that Strzok, perhaps with the involvement of other FBI officials, made a conscious and informed choice to hold off on the Weiner laptop until after the election. Strzok said as much to the IG. (See below) There is no chance that the matter simply fell through the cracks.

FBI officials offered the IG a litany of explanations for their failure to take prompt action on the Clinton-related Weiner emails. The IG report analyzed the explanations and found every one of them to be “unpersuasive.” This characterization is charitable given the report’s conclusions that the proffered explanations ranged from the “illogical” (326) to the following outright falsehood:

“Several FBI witnesses told us that the reason the FBI decided to seek a search warrant on October 27 was because the [Clinton] team learned important new information about the contents of the Weiner laptop at around that time. We concluded, however, that this decision resulted not from the discovery of dramatic new information about the Weiner laptop, but rather as a result of inquiries from the Weiner case agent and prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for SDNY on October 21.” (330)

Indeed, the IG found that by no later than September 29, the Washington FBI had learned virtually every fact that it cited in late October as justification for obtaining the search warrant. (324)

Strzok suggested that he didn’t expect the emails to be significant and that they were just a lead to be pursued at some point, “January, February 2017, whenever it gets done.” (298) He considered the perceived need to pursue the emails more urgently to be “misplaced” since “[w]e did not know what was there.” (326)

Strzok (and others) also said that they considered the Russia investigation a higher priority than the Weiner emails. (328-329) The IG found, however, that the FBI had ample resources to assign to the Weiner emails. The report added with specific reference to Strzok’s role:

“In assessing the decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the [Clinton]-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop, we were particularly concerned about text messages sent by Strzok and Page that potentially indicated or created the appearance that investigative decisions they made were impacted by bias or improper considerations. . . . Under these circumstances, we do not have confidence that Strzok’s decision to prioritize the Russia investigation over following up on the [Clinton]-related investigative lead discovered on the Weiner laptop was free from bias.” (p. ix)

The IG was right to be particularly skeptical of Strzok’s stated justification. His explanation that the Weiner emails should not be given priority attention because the FBI “did not know what was there” is circular and implausible on its face. Obviously, the way to find out “what was there” was to take a look. Strzok could easily have obtained a search warrant and sent a few agents “to get eyes on this thing and figure out what we have,” as McCabe put it. (281) His decision to forego even this minimal effort clearly demonstrates willful blindness, reflecting a desire not to know what was in the emails.

The bogus nature of this explanation becomes even clearer when one considers the background at that time. Strzok’s superiors in the FBI immediately recognized the discovery of the Weiner emails as a “big deal” and expected him to take action. The FBI leadership treated it as an even bigger deal when they finally took action in late October. It must have been obvious to Strzok as well that if there was any chance that the Weiner emails contained anything new, they could potentially impact the disposition of the Clinton investigation as well as the upcoming presidential election.

Conclusions. The IG report stops short of flatly asserting that the FBI’s delay in dealing with the Weiner emails resulted from political bias or other improper considerations. However, the facts it presents virtually compel this conclusion under the IG’s own criteria. The report points to Strzok as the FBI official directly responsible for the delay, although certainly not the only one who could (or should) be accountable. It makes clear that the delay was no accident. It presents abundant evidence of Strzok’s political bias, including his willingness (indeed, his apparent determination) to “stop” Trump’s election. It then concludes that there was no legitimate reason for the delay—i.e., all the stated justifications were pretextual. Connecting these dots, the delay could only be attributable to political or other improper considerations.

Delaying the examination of the Weiner emails would have helped Clinton’s electoral chances had it run its course. As fate would have it, however, the FBI was forced to dramatically reverse course in the run-up to the election. One can speculate on whether the delay was motivated by political bias per se or perhaps some other inappropriate reason or reasons such as avoiding embarrassment to the FBI or currying favor from presumed incoming President Clinton. What can be said with certainty is that if delay on the Weiner emails was intended to help Clinton’s electoral chances or somehow protect the FBI, it backfired spectacularly and ultimately achieved precisely the opposite effect.

Many conservatives (see this op-ed, for example) criticize the tactics being used by the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students and other youths in their remarkable campaign for gun reform. These critics accuse the students of engaging in over-the-top rhetoric that demonizes gun rights advocates while offering no workable countermeasures to stem the carnage from guns that seems to be an all too common feature of American life. Gun control issues are complicated, the critics say, and call for reasoned, fact-based debate rather than demagoguery.

The latter point is certainly valid; effective measures to abate gun violence will only come through the good faith, fully informed and thoughtful efforts of many actors. However, for the NRA and its supporters to press this point is beyond hypocritical. They have spent decades doing everything within their considerable powers to prevent any rational, fact-based debate over gun control. They relentlessly attack even the most modest reform proposals as existential threats to Second Amendment rights. They have gone so far as to actively impede federal efforts to conduct research and even to develop and share background data relevant to guns. While they claim to support rigorous enforcement of existing gun control laws, they often work behind the scenes to subvert enforcement of those laws.

To the extent that the campaign by student activists currently elevates hyperbole over reasoned analysis, it simply takes a page directly from the NRA’s playbook. Unfortunately, this approach probably is the only way to focus attention sufficient to initiate substantive action on any controversial subject in today’s hyper-polarized environment. Hopefully, the students’ campaign will prove to be the catalyst so badly needed to generate real discussion and develop meaningful strategies to address our epidemic of gun violence. The tragedy at Stoneman Douglas already has prompted some “baby steps” in this direction but much more needs to be done.

As the attached article points out, an annual appropriation rider sought by the NRA and first enacted in the 1990’s greatly impedes federal research efforts aimed at developing strategies to reduce gun violence. Of all the sorry aspects of our ludicrous gun politics, this one takes the cake. Due to the rider’s restrictions, policymakers currently have little objective hard data to inform what strategies might or might not be effective, and consequently, they are left to consider often radically different approaches largely in a vacuum.

The appropriation rider has received little scrutiny over the years, probably surviving due in part to its obscurity. Surely the time has come to shine the light of day on it. In today’s climate, it’s hard to imagine how anyone (including a halfway savvy NRA representative) could argue with a straight face for its continuation. Reportedly, even the original congressional sponsor of the rider came to regret it. The issues surrounding the causes and prevention of gun violence are complex. In the absence of credible research findings, however, the so-called debate over these issues will continue to default to the mainly fact-free assertions, tendentious political rhetoric, and outright demagoguery of ideologues on all sides and their partisan allies.

If there is any “low hanging fruit” to target in terms of a meaningful bipartisan first step toward addressing gun violence, eliminating this absurd appropriation rider undoubtedly qualifies.

 

How the FBI handled the trove of Clinton-related emails it found on Anthony Weiner’s computer (apparently supplied by his former wife, Huma Abedin) created a monumental uproar on the eve of the 2016 presidential election. The Wall Street Journal and Washington Post now report that senior FBI officials, including Deputy Director McCabe, knew of these emails at least a month before then-Director James Comey notified Congress in the waning days of the election campaign that the Bureau was reopening its Clinton email investigation based on their discovery. Why on earth didn’t the FBI expeditiously analyze these newly-discovered emails during this 30-day period in order to determine whether they materially affected the Clinton investigation? Doing so would have avoided the fiasco that resulted when, within two weeks preceding the election, Comey first  informed Congress of the emails and then several days later said in effect “never mind.” (Once the damage was done by Comey’s initial submittal, the FBI was able to determine within just a few days of intense review that the Weiner emails were not significant.) Understandably, Comey’s actions drew intense scorn from both political sides as well as many objective sources. It’s not clear when during the 30-day period Comey became aware of the new emails.

The subject of this 30-day gap seems to be overshadowed for the moment by the virtual political war over the Nunes memo. However, the Justice Department’s inspector general is said to be focusing on this subject as part of his overall review of the FBI’s Clinton email investigation. There are hints in media reports that whatever McCabe did or didn’t do in relation to the Weiner emails was the real cause for his early departure from the Bureau. The inspector general’s report is expected to be completed within a few months. What it reveals may well prove to have greater and more lasting importance than the bruhaha over the Nunes memo.

The normally routine question of who takes over as acting head of a federal agency when the leadership position becomes vacant has turned into a major political and legal contest in the case of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The Dodd-Frank Act, which created the CFPB, establishes the position of CFPB Director as a Presidential appointee subject to Senate confirmation. The Act further  provides for a CFPB Deputy Director “who shall (A) be appointed by the Director; and (B) serve as acting Director in the absence or unavailability of the Director.” On November 24, the last day of his tenure, former CFPB Director Richard Cordray appointed his chief of staff, Leandra English, Deputy Director in order for her to become Acting Director upon his departure pursuant to the quoted Dodd-Frank provision. (Ms. English, who had occupied political positions in the Obama Administration, converted to her career position at CFPB shortly before President Trump took office.)

However, on the evening of November 24, President Trump announced that he was appointing Mick Mulvaney, currently Director of the Office of Management and Budget, as Acting Director of the CFPB pursuant to the Federal Vacancies Reform Act. The Vacancies Reform Act is a statute of broader applicability dealing with the assignment of acting officials to vacancies in executive branch positions, such as CFPB Director, that require Presidential appointment and Senate confirmation (known as “PAS” positions). Among other things, this statute authorizes the President to temporarily fill a vacant PAS position with someone already serving in another PAS position, such as Mulvaney.

At the time Cordray appointed English as Deputy Director he stated that he was positioning her to become Acting Director in order to “ensure an orderly succession for this independent agency,” to “minimize operational disruption,” and to “provide for a smooth transition.” The irony of this statement became apparent on Monday morning, November 27, when both Mulvaney and English reported to CFPB, each claiming to be the rightful Acting Director. English promptly sued Trump and Mulvaney seeking to oust Mulvaney and have herself declared the legitimate Acting Director. (She actually filed her lawsuit on Sunday, November 26.)

The judge assigned to the case denied English’s request for emergency relief but the lawsuit could drag on for some time if English persists. As long as it continues, one can expect great uncertainty to prevail both within CFPB and among those affected by its actions. The dispute also smacks of a well-orchestrated political circus. Mulvaney seems to have seized control at least as de facto Acting Director. However, the doughnuts he supplied for the staff are unlikely to alleviate their stress since his general contempt for the Bureau is well known. Meanwhile, several Democratic Senators posed for grandstanding photos with English and staged protests outside the Bureau’s offices. This sorry episode provides further evidence, if any is needed, of the hyper-partisanship, with its attendant chaos and dysfunction, that seems to define the federal government today.

The legal arguments focus primarily on the interplay between the Dodd-Frank Act and the Vacancies Reform Act: Is Dodd-Frank’s specific provision for the CFPB Deputy Director to become Acting Director the exclusive means of temporarily filling a vacancy in the Director position or does the more general Vacancies Reform Act authority remain available as another option, thereby enabling the President to make his own choice? The competing legal arguments, which debate at length the meaning of the language as well as the legislative and drafting histories of the two statutes, need not be rehashed here. For those interested, the following links lay out the respective statutory arguments in favor of Mulvaney and English.

The Mulvaney supporters appear to have the stronger case based on the statutory interpretation arguments alone. Even the CFPB’s general counsel concluded that Mulvaney is the rightful Acting Director. In any event, I’d submit that two broader considerations remove any doubt and thoroughly undercut the case for English.

First, accepting the argument that the Dodd-Frank provision is the exclusive vehicle for obtaining an Acting CFPB Director leads to an untenable result. By the logic of this argument, there could be no Acting Director at all if a Deputy Director was not in place when a vacancy arose. Under this entirely plausible scenario (English was not named Deputy Director until the day Cordray left), the CFPB’s work would grind to a halt until a new Director was formally nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Congress could not have intended such a result.[1]

Second, this argument not only leads to a potentially absurd result but also one that is patently unconstitutional. Making appointments to executive agencies is a fundamental presidential function under the Constitution. The President’s appointment power is not absolute. In order to protect the Senate’s own constitutional prerogative of advice and consent, Congress may place some restrictions on the President’s ability to leave acting officials in vacant PAS positions. The time limits imposed by the Vacancies Reform Act reflect this. However, Congress surely cannot flatly preclude the President from making any temporary appointment to fill a vacancy in an executive agency PAS position. Yet this is the effect of the position advanced by English supporters and, indeed, their purpose as well. It’s abundantly clear that their primary goal is to prevent President Trump from assuming control over the CFPB through his own appointee(s) for as long as they possibly can. Thus, if Dodd-Frank was construed to preempt the President’s authority to appoint an acting head of CFPB, it would be unconstitutional.

Finally, I wonder whether English even has the requisite standing to maintain her suit. It’s at least questionable whether she can assert a legally enforceable right to the Acting Director position or that she suffers a legally cognizable injury if denied that position.

Eventually President Trump will succeed in putting a new CFPB Director in place. One can only hope that in the meantime English and her supporters will abandon their obstructionist efforts and allow the Bureau to go on with its business. Prolonging this dispute simply forestalls the inevitable, accomplishes nothing constructive, and feeds into the claims of its many critics that CFPB is an unconstitutional and out of control rogue agency.

[1] Perhaps English’s supporters would concede that the President could still exercise his constitutional authority to make a recess appointment somewhat sooner if the opportunity arose. However, this is hardly a satisfactory alternative.

Racist acts in recent years have fueled a campaign to expunge all Confederate monuments and other symbols from public places–except, perhaps, museums. The campaign is expanding to target monuments to a host of non-Confederate historic figures who may be viewed as offending contemporary standards in some way. For the reasons stated below, a more reasonable and measured response would be to focus on removing only those Confederate symbols that have been co-opted by hate groups for use as props in their activities. The rest should remain, leaving members of the public free to draw their own conclusions about them.

Some specific Confederate symbols have in effect been appropriated by racists and, as a result, are now widely identified as objects of hate notwithstanding their more nuanced historical significance. A prime example is the Confederate battle flag. Similarly, hate groups have seized upon certain individual memorials as venues for their activities. An example is the Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville, Virginia. After the recent violence there, the city’s mayor proposed that this statue be removed because it had become a “magnet for terrorism” and a potential threat to public safety from hate groups who may revisit it. The same rationale, if based on well-founded concerns, could apply to other monuments used by hate groups. If such monuments are removed, the blame falls squarely on the hate groups.

A case-by-case approach to deciding the fate of Confederate symbols addresses the problems that gave rise to the recent concerns without launching a wholesale movement to censor our history. Such an assault on controversial historical figures, including many with no connection to the Confederacy, is Orwellian and un-American. It also goes far beyond the causes of the current controversy. Hate groups have not tried to enlist memorials to Columbus, Washington, Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt or the many other historic figures who have nevertheless come under attack.

Background of concerns over Confederate iconography.

There are about 700 Confederate monuments in public places throughout the United States, and a total of about 1,500 Confederate symbols in all. (Symbolism other than monuments includes cities, streets, buildings, and military bases named for Confederates as well as Confederate-themed flags and holidays.) The Confederate monuments are located primarily but not exclusively in the South. They were erected mainly in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries.

Most of these monuments stood for generations without attracting much controversy, or perhaps much notice in recent times. What jump-started the current controversy was the Confederate imagery embraced by Dylann Roof, the racist murderer of nine African-Americans in a Charleston church. The reaction to Roof’s horrific crime fueled a campaign to remove the Confederate flag from public display, which spread to statues of Confederate figures and other Confederate symbols. The campaign has intensified in the wake of the recent mayhem in Charlottesville.

Attacks on currently disfavored historic icons are antithetical to an enlightened democracy.

Destroying historic monuments is a hallmark of barbarians like ISIS and the Taliban as well as the totalitarian thugs of Mao’s Red Guards. This is not good company for Americans to keep. Images of a North Carolina mob tearing down a statue of a generic Confederate soldier (not even a slave-holding general) and then kicking and spitting on it are particularly troublesome in this regard. Most nations that are enlightened and secure in who they are deal forthrightly with ambiguous and even notorious symbols of their past rather than sweeping them under the carpet. Some historic icons may have become so reprehensible that expunging them is justified, e.g., the swastika, an ancient symbol of well-being that is now and probably forever linked to Nazism. However, these should be rare exceptions.

The even broader campaign to sanitize our history by targeting a wide range of non-Confederate figures as well smacks of empty symbolism and political correctness. It is promoted by those in academia, the media and elsewhere who regard racism and oppression as the defining characteristics of the United States from its inception until today. They seek to enforce this perspective as the lens through which to view our history and historic figures, to the exclusion of everything else.[1]

Historical rationales advanced to justify mass removal of Confederate monuments are tenuous at best.

While some historians urge caution in evaluating Confederate monuments, many others claim that the monuments were erected for the sole purpose of promoting racism. Typical is an article by Karen Cox, a history professor, captioned “the whole point of Confederate monuments is to celebrate white supremacy.” A similar article, based on interviews with like-thinking historians, claims that the statues were erected only to “further a white supremacist future.” These assertions are long on innuendo but short on corroborating evidence.

As Professor Cox notes, the vast majority of the statues were sponsored by an organization called the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC). They were located in cemeteries, on battlefields, and at many other places. The UDC had seven stated goals, none of which is explicitly or implicitly racist. The first goal was to “honor the memory of those who served and those who fell in the service of the Confederate States.”

The historians ignore the UDC’s stated goals, apparently rejecting out of hand hand the possibility that anything but racism could explain the UDC’s work. They seem to regard UDC’s avowed purposes as mere pretext to mask its true racist motives. To make their case that racism actually motivated the UDC monument-building, historians rely on selective inferences drawn from facts that are subject to other interpretations:

• They point out that most UDC-sponsored monuments were built during a time (late 1800’s and early 1900’s) of virulent racism across the South. However, this also was a time when the Confederate dead were still fresh in the memories of their immediate families and surviving veterans were dying off.
• They note that another more modest spike in monument-building occurred during the civil rights era of the mid 1960’s. However, these  were also the centennial years of the Civil War.
• They infer an intent to intimidate African-Americans from the fact that a number of statues were placed in front of courthouses. However, courthouse squares, often found in the center of towns, are a natural location for monuments.

Absent supporting evidence, it is both unreasonable and unfair to conclude that the UDC had no genuine interest in honoring the memories of Confederate soldiers but sought only to advance white racism. It is plausible to conclude that the UDC operated from a variety of motives. For example, there is evidence that part of its agenda was to romanticize the Confederate “lost cause.” However, there is no evidence to rebut the conclusion that the UDC’s efforts stemmed at least primarily from its stated purpose to commemorate Confederate veterans.

Another historical justification some advance is that “traitors” don’t deserve monuments. This is also a dubious rationale for removing Confederate monuments. Importantly, when the Civil War ended Union leaders decided in the interests of reunification that Confederates should not be treated as traitors.[2] Indeed, until very recently many Confederate figures were viewed respectfully rather than as traitors. For example, President Eisenhower kept a portrait of Robert E. Lee in the Oval Office. Ten United States military installations are named for Confederate officers. Branding the Confederates as traitors at this late date appears to be mainly a rationalization offered to differentiate them from other slave-owners such as many of our Nation’s founders whose memorials may be in jeopardy under the “slippery slope” we are now descending. (See below.)

In sum, the glib historical arguments for removing Confederate monuments rest on a tendentious reading of history that stems more from liberal confirmation bias and groupthink than evidence-based scholarship. (See here and here.)

The campaign against Confederate monuments has morphed into a broader assault on American history.

Some express concern that removing Confederate memorials will lead us down a “slippery slope” reaching a wide range of non-Confederate historic figures who run afoul of contemporary standards. Critics initially dismissed this concern as a “red herring.” Clearly it is not; a movement to sanitize our history by exorcising monuments and symbols of all kinds is already well underway. The most strident voices, particularly those who make their living promoting racial strife, reject any distinction between Confederates and slave-owners such as Washington and Jefferson. Proponents of statue-removal have reached even farther to target historic figures who were neither Confederates nor slave-holders but are viewed as offensive in some way notwithstanding their other accomplishments and historic importance. A few of the many additional targets are listed here.

The most extreme example of this approach is New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s commission to consider the removal of “all statues and monuments that in any way may suggest hate or division or racism, anti-Semitism–any kind of message that is against the values of New York City.”  Given the ever-evolving “values” of our PC culture, are any historical figures unblemished enough to retain their pedestals under these criteria?

Mass removal of monuments won’t help bridge our racial divides but could widen them.

The most unfortunate aspect of the wholesale campaign against Confederate and other monuments is that it distracts attention from  confronting more serious racial issues. (See here and here.) The monuments have attracted little interest or concern until now. There is no reason to think that their presence has damaged race relations; nor is there any reason to expect that their removal will improve race relations. Regrettably, the current hype over the monuments is typical of many contemporary approaches to race issues. We tend to opt for symbolism and tokenism over the much more difficult work of exploring underlying causes and solutions. This may afford a “feel good” moment of self-righteousness but it accomplishes nothing of substance and ultimately trivializes racial concerns.

Worse still, attacks on the monuments may well exacerbate racial polarization, thereby serving the interests only of extremists on either side who benefit from it. Those who see the United States as fundamentally and irredeemably racist will not be mollified by removal of Confederate monuments. This will only encourage demands for action against other historic figures with racially suspect aspects to their pasts. At the other extreme, white nationalists and their ilk will seize upon removal of monuments as further evidence that white culture is under attack and in need of their version of countermeasures. Fortunately, most people fall between these extremes. However, polling indicates that a majority of Americans do not view Confederate memorials as racist and thus favor their retention.[3] They would likely view removal of the monuments as an unwarranted punitive attack on our history and another example of political correctness run amok. This, in turn, could cause them to look skeptically at more meaningful initiatives to address racial problems.

[1] Some go so far as to suggest that Western civilization in general is racist.

[2] One could maintain that the Confederates did not set out to be “traitors.” Before the Civil War, there was at least a plausible argument that States had a right to secede from the Union. Indeed, certain States in New England were the first to threaten secession. Of course, this argument was effectively put to rest by the Civil War. A Supreme Court decision shortly thereafter confirmed that secession was unconstitutional.

[3] The polls show that African-Americans are ambivalent on the issue. According to the polls, leftist ideologues are the only group to strongly support removal of Confederate iconography.

Most Americans probably welcomed yesterday’s solar eclipse as a brief distraction and respite from the bad news that seems to envelop us every day—most recently Charlottesville, Confederate monuments, and Trump’s response to these divisive subjects. “Not so fast,” says The Atlantic magazine. It recently published under the category of “science” an article by a Brooklyn College law professor captioned “American Blackout: A tour of the solar eclipse’s path reveals a nation that fought to maintain a different sort of totality.” The article asserts that “almost no black people” live along the path of the eclipse across the United States. The author’s nearly 5,000-word tome goes on to detail how at each point in its route from the west to the east coast the absence of black residents results from our Nation’s history of pervasive racism.[1] (The author also manages to work in several other themes apparently, in her view, somehow related to the eclipse such as the undemocratic nature of the electoral college process for electing presidents.)

While grudgingly conceding that the eclipse itself is not racist, the author suggests that its mostly white pathway constitutes some kind of an omen:

“Presumably, this is not explained by the implicit bias of the solar system. It is a matter of population density, and more specifically geographic variations in population density by race, for which the sun and the moon cannot be held responsible. Still, an eclipse chaser is always tempted to believe that the skies are relaying a message.”

It’s not clear what to make of this article. Even the liberal website Vox found the point of the article “hard-to-parse.” Perhaps it is an attempt to outdo the Onion or maybe it is a bizarre attempt at allegory. In any event, it demonstrates that no subject is beyond politicization today and that the most strident voices among us will see the dark side (pun intended) of everything.

[1] Actually, the body of the article contradicts the author’s exaggerated assertion that “almost no black people” live along the eclipse’s path. At best, she has exercised considerable poetic license.